


An odd pair

by socially_awkward_di



Category: Pentagon (Korea Band)
Genre: Ballroom Dancing, M/M, Slow Burn, weird au, wooyu
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-08
Updated: 2020-07-26
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:34:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25145512
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/socially_awkward_di/pseuds/socially_awkward_di
Summary: Wooseok has to learn ballroom dancing as a part of his training. What a shame there's not enough female partners in the studio.wooyu ballroom dancing au no one asked for
Relationships: Adachi Yuto/Jung Wooseok
Comments: 8
Kudos: 27





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Good time of the day~
> 
> As for the world: everyone, except Yuto, is a trainee in the same company; wooyu are eighteen year-olds.

‘No-o, hyung, why-y-y do I have to go?’ Wooseok turned into a whiny baby.

‘You are going to become an artist, you need to be a well-rounded dancer as well,’ Hui sighed and started explaining everything for the third time.

‘But what are the chances of us ever doing a concept like that?’

‘You never know, Seok-ah. Plus it’s not even a one-year course. Just six months.’

‘Six months?!’ Wooseok clenched his heart in fake shock. ‘Why am I the only one going though? Does Shinwon hyung know how to dance cha-cha-cha?’

Hui scratched at the back of his head:

‘Well, he threatened to leave the company if we sent him there so I’ll be giving him private lessons.’

‘Ugh. Being a trainee sucks,’ Wooseok stomped his foot.

~~~~~

That’s how Wooseok found himself in the ballroom dance studio. Surprisingly, there were quite a few people there, almost an equal amount of girls and boys. 

The ballroom was big and empty, it reminded Wooseok of loft style. High walls were made of bricks, there were huge windows on both sides of the room and gigantic mirrors that covered an entire wall in the front. The floor was very shiny and slippery, Wooseok barely resisted an urge to slide on it just for fun. In one of the corners stood a table, a chair and a very modern stereo-system. If only he had one of those.

He then scanned the room to see any fellow sufferers. Some people were already talking standing in small circles, others were nervously looking around. There was one boy who seemed out of place, just like Wooseok. He was quite tall, slim, with tanned skin and bowl cut black hair. _Must be a student,_ Wooseok thought to himself. But what was the most important thing — the guy looked like he didn’t want to be there.

‘Good morning, everybody,’ a cold loud voice greeted them and all the murmurs immediately died down. ‘My name is Kim Haeun and I’ll be your ballroom dance teacher for the next six months. If you came here thinking it’ll be a walk in the park, you thought wrong. Please, leave. Ballroom dancing is a proper sport and I want to make professionals out of you.’

Wooseok felt uneasy. He looked around the room once again and noticed that some people were glancing at each other, eyes filled with nervousness. 

‘First of all, girls — buns and proper shoes. No loose hair in this room. I doubt you want to slice your partner’s eyeball, do you? Boys — proper shoes, too. Secondly, your posture. No slouching. If you can’t at least keep your back straight, I doubt you can keep your life together. And lastly, respect. Rome was not built in one day. You will look ridiculous for the first week or so but don’t even try to comment on your colleagues’ dancing. Understood?’

No one dared to open their mouth.

‘I said UNDERSTOOD?’

‘YES, MA’AM!’ Suddenly the room erupted with different voices.

_Are we in the military or something? If I see hyung tomorrow he’d better run._

‘Good. Now the fun part. I give you ten seconds to find a partner. Be wise as this choice will have consequences. One, two, three — GO!’

Previously quiet, the ballroom turned into chaos, people were running around, practically fighting for girls and boys. Wooseok was so confused that he completely forgot that he had to find someone to dance with. Suddenly Mrs. Kim blew the whistle and the room became quiet again. 

Everyone was standing in pairs except for Wooseok and the guy he had noticed previously. Wait a second…A GUY?!

‘Ugh, I’m sorry but I don’t have a partner,’ Wooseok raised his hand to attract teacher’s attention.

‘Is that so, young man? I think you are wrong. Look, we have another gentleman that chose to ignore my words,’ a sly smile appeared on her face.

‘But…,’ Wooseok’s eyes met the guy’s. ‘But we are both boys…’

‘Oh, really?’ She pretended to be surprised. ‘That’s a revelation. Do you have any allergies maybe?’

‘No..?’ Wooseok was confused.

‘Then quickly pair with mister?’ She looked at the guy.

‘Adachi,’ he said in a barely audible voice looking at his feet.

‘Pair with mister Adachi and stop taking our time away, will you?!’ She looked pissed so Wooseok didn’t dare to argue with her. 

He motioned for the Adachi guy to come to his place since he was standing in the far back of the class unlike Adachi who was at the front. The guy complied and stood next to him.

‘Okay. We’ll start with some simple warming up exercises,’ the teacher went to the stereo-system on turned it on. A very energetic song started playing. 

They were doing those _simple_ exercises for about half an hour only and Wooseok was already out of breath. However, it seemed like everyone in the room was having a hard time, except for Mrs. Kim.

‘Wow. My expectations for all of you were low but now…I am speechless,’ disappointment could be easily sensed in her tone. ‘Okay. Let’s move to dancing. The base of almost all of the dances is a square. Hopefully you all know what a square is, do you?’

Everyone was panting.

‘I asked DO YOU?!’

‘YES, MA’AM!’

‘Good. Now face each other. Girls, your backs should be facing the mirror. Boys, yours — the door. Boys, put your right hand on your partner’s waist and stretch your left arm to the left taking your partner’s right hand. But make a small curve. We are trying to be elegant here. Girls, put your left hand on your partner’s right. I’ll now demonstrate,’ she proceeded to show both poses. She then started moving from pair to pair checking whether they had understood the task correctly.

With a sigh Wooseok turned to Adachi:

‘Well, can I have your right hand? Please.’

‘What?’ The guy looked surprised. ‘Who decided that you’ll be the male partner?’

‘I’m taller,’ Wooseok shrugged.

‘So what?’ 

‘Ugh, so that means I’m the male one.’

‘How old are you?’

‘Em, eighteen?’

‘What month were you born in?’

‘January.’

‘Day?’

‘Thirty first.’

‘Ha!’ The guy smiled. ‘I’m older! For several days that is but still.’

‘Okay, let’s decide this like two grown-ups, huh?’ Wooseok said in a calm voice but this Adachi guy was already getting on his nerves.

‘Sure.’

‘Gawi bawi bo!’

Wooseok showed scissors and the guy…paper!

‘Yes-s-s, let’s get it!’ Wooseok felt relieved. 

‘Let’s play a total of three!’

‘No.’

‘Yes.’

‘No.’

‘Yes.’

‘Khm,’ with the heated argument going on the two of them failed to notice Mrs. Kim who was standing right next to them and looked very unhappy, to say the least. ‘Am I interrupting something, young men?’

‘No, sorry,’ both of them bowed and looked at their feet. Wooseok felt his face heat up — the entire class was looking at them.

‘Maybe you’ll finally do what you were asked to do then?’ Her voice was stone cold.

‘Yes, ma’am.’

The guy with the sourest expression on his face stood in front of Wooseok facing the door. Jung clumsily put his right hand on Adachi’s waist.

‘Don’t be shy, young man. Mister Adachi is not made of porcelain, he won’t break if you properly grip his waist.’

With even redder face Wooseok tightened his grip. 

‘Good. Now mind your posture,’ she gave him an inquiring look.

‘Jung. Jung Wooseok.’

‘Jung Wooseok. And you, Adachi, be a tad more elegant, you are a female partner after all,’ with these words she marched back to the front of the class.

They started learning the moves. As both boys were too tall and lanky, they looked like two baby giraffes trying to walk for the first time. Wooseok constantly stepped on the partner’s foot. Adachi couldn’t understand whether they were going right or left. After thirty minutes they were ready to kill each other.

‘Listen,’ Wooseok said between gritted teeth. ‘It’s just one two three four, one to three four. Can’t you remember the pattern?!’

‘Hey, you are the one messing everything up! I can’t feel my toes because of you!’

‘Well, if you moved properly I wouldn’t clash with your legs!’

‘You-‘

‘You!’

‘Our lovely pair in the back! If you interrupt our class one more time — GET OUT OF HERE! Both of you!’ Mrs. Kim gave them a death glare.

‘YES, MA’AM!’

‘It’s all because of you,’ Wooseok whispered once everyone returned to practicing.

‘Yeah-yeah, of course,’ said Adachi in a mocking tone.

Half an hour later the music finally stopped.

‘That’s the end of the class. See you in two days. Good bye,’ just like that Mrs. Kim was out of the studio. 

Everyone was breathing heavily. Who would have thought that ballroom dancing could be this tiring. Adachi was fanning himself with his own T-shirt. Wooseok prepared to leave but be fore that he finally decided to ask:

‘By the way, what’s your name?’

‘Yuto.’

‘See you soon, Yuto. Don’t forget about the bun and shoes,’ Wooseok winked and headed towards the door.

Yuto rolled his eyes and made no comment.

~~~~

What did they both get themselves into?


	2. Chapter 2

‘So, how was the first day?’ Changgu asked while they were all sitting at the dining table each holding a cup of instant noodles.

Wooseok looked wilted:

‘Don’t ask.’

‘What, your partner is better than you?’ Hongseok smirked munching on his noodles.

‘If only,' the maknae sighed. 'He is as bad as me, if not worse.’

‘HE?!’ Everyone present at the table exclaimed.

‘Yup,’ Wooseok looked into the cup picturing Yuto’s face in the broth. ‘His name is Yuto and he is a guy.’

‘How did that happened? Are two males allowed to form a pair?’ Asked Jinho. ‘Not that that’s something bad or anything. It’s just... I have never seen such pairs during contests and all.’ He added hurriedly.

Wooseok shrugged:

‘To be honest, hyung, I have no idea. There aren’t enough girls in the studio and I kinda pissed the teacher off. Well, we both did. So for the next six months Yuto is my partner. At least I managed to win the rock-paper-scissors game so I'm dancing the male parts,’ he smiled bitterly.

‘Don’t worry, Seok-ah,’ Hui put his hand on Wooseok’s shoulder and gently massaged it. ‘Maybe everything will be better than you think.’

Unfortunately, it wasn’t.

Wooseok had been attending the classes for three full weeks already and each day was worse than the previous one. They were learning Viennese waltz and everyone was making at least some progress, except for the sour milk couple as Mrs. Kim called them. Technically, they made almost no mistakes when dancing but the overall impression was worse than of those who stumbled sometimes. 

‘Okay, stop!’ Mrs. Kim shouted turning off the music. ‘Let’s have a small break. Don’t drink too much water at once though.’ She sat on the chair and started writing something in the journal. Some people collapsed on the floor massaging their sore feet, others went to the changing rooms to drink some water.

Wooseok looked at Yuto:

‘We should do something about it,’ he sounded serious.

‘Yeah,’ Yuto awkwardly scratched at the back of his head. ‘I really don’t know what’s the problem though.’

‘Same here. Maybe…’ The boy looked hesitant. ‘We should ask Mrs. Kim?’

Yuto chocked on air:

‘Are you for real now? She practically hates us. If we start bothering her during the break KIMchi will kill us.’

‘Come on, she is not _that_ bad,’ Wooseok tried to persuade his partner, though he wasn’t fond of the idea himself. ‘Let’s try at least. We are not losing anything,’ he took Yuto’s hand and started dragging him to the corner where the table stood. 

‘Yeah, except for our lives and dignity,’ mumbled Adachi. 

They stood next to Mrs. Kim, like two guilty boys, looking at their feet. The teacher didn’t even raise her head to acknowledge their presence. 

‘Khm, teacher Kim,’ Wooseok cleared his throat. 

‘Yes,’ she finally looked at them.

‘We-’ Began Yuto.

‘We wanted to ask for some advice,’ finished Wooseok.

‘What do you mean?’ She wanted them to admit their problem, to themselves in the first place.

‘We have been practicing diligently but we are making no progress. Our waltz looks awkward and unattractive, despite Wooseok and me making almost no mistakes,’ Yuto tried to explain. 

‘Well, there is your answer, boys,’ Mrs. Kim said with a smile. 

‘What?’ Both of them were confused. 

‘Repeat your last phrase, Yuto-yah.’

‘Um…Wooseok makes no mistakes. Me neither.’

‘See? We have Wooseok who makes no mistakes and Yuto who makes no mistakes but dancing is not about individuals, it’s about teamwork. Yes, other pairs keep making mistakes but they are making them _together_ and that’s why you want to continue watching the story they are telling through their dance. When watching you two, I only see Wooseok who concentrates on the sequence of steps and Yuto who does the same. That’s why neither of you look graceful, that’s why your dance will never evolve.’

The boys were astonished. Somehow everything they’d just heard made perfect sense. They were two separate dancers who for some reason were holding hands.

‘What should we do then?’ Wooseok broke the silence. 

‘Hm,’ Mrs. Kim looked around the studio. ‘Look at your fellow colleagues. What do you see?’

They turned around. Some pairs were sitting on the floor giggling, others were chatting. One male dancer kneeled down to fix his partner’s shoe. One female dancer was helping her partner with stretching. 

‘You see how close they are?’ She asked in soft voice. ‘They are friends in the first place and dance partners in the second. Of course it’s not like that all the time and professionals don’t need to be too close to their partner but even then one can never dance with someone whose presence they cannot stand. And let me remind you that the two of you are far from being professionals. Okay, enough talking. Everyone! End of the break!’ She said in her usual tone and stood up.

Wooseok and Yuto headed to their place. Throughout the rest of the class Wooseok couldn’t get Mrs. Kim’s words out of his head. _They are friends in the first place and dance partners in the second._ What about the two of them? Wooseok knew nothing about Yuto: how old was he? What were his hobbies? Why did he decide to join the ballroom dance club?

‘That’s the end of the class! Good job, everyone! See you in two days.’ As always Mrs. Kim was out of the studio. 

Yuto looked like he was thinking about something too. However, he turned to Wooseok and said quietly:

‘Um, see you on Friday?’ He was about to leave.

‘Wait,’ Wooseok suddenly grabbed his hand but he immediately let go of it. Holding hands while dancing felt different for some reason. ‘I…We…Um, do you want to go somewhere tomorrow? Like a cafe, for example? To get to know each other better and all,’ he was avoiding looking Yuto in the face at all costs. 

‘Yeah, sure,’ the other one replied with a nod and a small smile. ‘Let’s meet next to the studio at two p.m.?’

‘Okay, sounds good,’ Wooseok returned the smile, feeling relieved.


	3. Chapter 3

Tomorrow came too fast for Wooseok’s liking. Yet he still dragged himself to the studio, with a heavy heart that is. Why was he doing this once again? He could have been playing games or listening to music in his own «chamber», as he usually called his dorm room, but no, he was standing in front of the building where he was tortured three times on a weekly basis. It was cloudy outside and Wooseok regretted not taking an umbrella or a jacket with him. 

The boy was deep in his thoughts when he heard a quiet «Hi» and felt a quick touch on his shoulder. The source of disturbance turned out to be Yuto.

‘Hi,’ Wooseok said back and gave the other a small smile. Yuto looked good in casual clothes: blue and black plaid bomber jacket, black skinny jeans and a pair of Vans. It suited him well, plus black seemed to be his signature colour since his dancing fit was always black. Wooseok went for an over-sized t-shirt with a print and baggy trousers. ‘Ehm, should we go somewhere?’

‘Yeah,’ Yuto nodded. ‘Any ideas?’

‘Hm, we can go to the park. I think it’s somewhere around here.’

‘Okay.’

They started walking. To say it was awkward is practically to say nothing. There was a _lot_ of tension between them; they didn’t talk much during the lessons but occasionally Yuto would ask Wooseok to watch him dance or vice versa and then they would discuss how to improve certain moves. Without that vital component (dancing), however, they were two strangers that had zero interest in each other. Wooseok was walking and silently cursing himself for inviting Yuto in the first place. Yuto, on the other hand, looked unbothered, he kept his eyes on the ground and occasionally absent-mindedly kicked small stones. 

Wooseok couldn’t bare the awkwardness anymore so he cleared his throat and asked:

‘So…uhm…you like dancing?’

Yuto didn’t even look at him. ‘Yeah. I do.’

_Wow. Much words. Very informative,_ Wooseok thought, he waited for a while expecting the other guy to ask him something in return or elaborate on his statement but nothing ever came.

‘Do you like ballroom dancing or someone makes you come there?’

‘I don’t mind it,’ said Yuto shortly.

They came to a small pond in the middle of the park. To their right was an ice cream truck and even though it was chilly outside Wooseok had an idea on how to break the ice between them (no pun intended).

‘Hey, do you want some ice cream? I can treat you since it was my idea to meet up?’ The younger suggested, praying to all the gods for Yuto to say he’d buy for the both of them as Wooseok had no money on him.

‘No, thank you. I’d rather not,’ Yuto’s response was short and cold. As always.

‘You don’t like ice cream?’ Wooseok was genuinely surprised. 

‘I like it. Just don’t want any right now,’ Yuto answered.

Wooseok sighed in fake relief:

‘Thank the Lord! I was afraid I’d have to give up on you as a partner. Who in their right mind don’t like ice cream?!’ He smiled.

‘A lot of people actually,’ said Yuto seriously.

The younger felt deflated:

‘Yeah, I was just joking. Anyway, what flavours do you like the most?’ He was still hoping Yuto would engage in the conversation properly.

‘A lot.’

‘Okay, top 3 ice cream flavours: Adachi Yuto edition?’

‘Chocolate. Peach. Lemon.’

Wooseok gave up. Almost on cue a very strong wind started blowing signifying the approach of the storm. Both of them shivered from the cold but no one said anything. Wooseok being the stubborn one decided to wait until Yuto suggests going to the cafe or going home. 

Ten minuted have passed. Then fifteen. They were still walking around the pond. Wooseok was cold to the core. He wouldn’t last another five minutes so he said with a sigh:

‘It’s getting cold. Should we go home?’

‘Yeah.’ 

They walked back to their meeting point. In silence. Wooseok was exhausted both physically and mentally. It’s very hard to be around someone who shows zero interest in the conversation with you, who doesn’t do small talk, who doesn’t even try to look engaged. 

‘Thank you for today,’ the younger said in a small voice, looking at his feet.

‘It was nice,’ said Yuto in response. 

_IT WAS WHAT?! NICE YOU SAY?!_ Wooseok was close to punching the guy in the face but instead he said:

‘See you tomorrow.’

Yuto nodded with a small smile. 

They turned back to back and started walking in the opposite directions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do I sense trouble in paradise? 🤔

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading ^-^
> 
> I really don't know if I want to continue this or not. Decided to write this while procrastinating but now I really am not sure if I have the mental capacity to finish an entire au >.<
> 
> Anyway, your expectations for me should be low.
> 
> Have a great day and thank you for stopping by <3


End file.
